Клер Донелли - The Big Kitty

“Well, maybe it seems like an outlandish notion around here, but I don’t like the idea of killing off anything that happens to get in my way, whether that means old folks—or even cats.”

Ignoring the cop’s startled look, she bent to scoop up Shadow and storm off. But the cat undercut her dramatic exit by somehow evading her arms. Feeling foolish, she straightened again with a glare. “Unless you need anything more from me?”

Constable Price shook his head, raising his hands almost defensively. “Don’t think so, ma’am. I’ll just be here guarding the … accident scene.”

Sunny started on her way home. The neighborhood was getting a bit busier, people gearing up for their Saturday activities.

She passed a family loading up their station wagon for some sort of shopping trip and got a laugh from a little girl. “Look, Mommy.”

Sunny glanced down. Her outfit was a bit on the scroungy side, but not that far out of the ordinary. Unless she’d managed to step in something cat related.

The girl’s mother smiled, too, but she wasn’t looking at Sunny. She was looking behind her. Sunny glanced over her shoulder. About six paces from her heels, Shadow sat on the pavement, apparently looking at nothing in particular.

Sunny started walking again. The girl giggled. Sunny turned to find Shadow still seated—and still about six paces behind her, his tail wrapped around his feet.

Taking three more steps, Sunny suddenly whirled on him again. Somehow, Shadow was still six paces behind her, still sitting. Except now, he twisted his own gaze around behind him, as if wondering what Sunny was looking at.

The little girl laughed even harder.

Sighing, Sunny resumed her walk, ignoring any chuckles she heard from her neighbors. Stupid cat wouldn’t let me pick him up, but he trails along behind me, she thought. Maybe Shadow is a good name for him.

She arrived home and held the door while Shadow walked in as if he owned the place. “Guess you’re better off here than dodging nets or whatever the animal control people have in store for you,” she told the cat.

“That you, Sunny?” Her dad’s voice came from the living room. She walked in to find him sitting on the couch with Mrs. Martinson, one of the widowed neighbor ladies. “Thought you’d be busy all morning.”

Mike was talking a bit fast. Sunny quickly realized that wasn’t because she’d walked in to find him entertaining a lady friend. Her dad was trying to brush sugary crumbs off his sweater.

“Nice to see you, Mrs. Martinson. Did you bring some of your famous coffee cake?” The words came out a bit sharper than Sunny meant them to.

“Sorry, dear, no.” Helena Martinson didn’t even turn a perfectly coiffed hair as she lied to Sunny. But then, the older woman had always shown a remarkable coolness in any social situation. Back when Sunny was in high school, Mrs. Martinson had been the hot mom all the boys lusted after. And even now, Sunny had to admit that her neighbor still looked pretty darned good. A well-cut pantsuit showed off her trim figure. Her pageboy hairstyle perfectly framed her delicate features, and somehow the silver threads among the gold had simply turned her into more of a platinum blonde.

Mrs. Martinson gave Sunny a bland smile, but Mike had a nervous grin—he hadn’t succeeded in getting rid of all the evidence of his illicit cake eating. Then his expression turned to a thunderous scowl when Shadow walked into the room. “What is that thing doing back?”

Shadow continued to the pool of light from the window and curled up.

Sunny paused for a moment, not sure where to begin. “I guess he’s going to be living here, because he doesn’t have a home anymore,” she finally said. “Ada Spruance is dead.”

Mike looked ready to dispute the idea of Shadow moving in, but Helena Martinson seized control of the conversation. “Oh, my!” She perched forward on her seat, her doll-like face alight with avid curiosity. “What happened, dear?”

No doubt she’s taking mental notes for the neighborhood gossip society, Sunny thought. “I found her as soon as I arrived,” she said aloud.

“Lucky thing you went over there.” Mike shot a dirty look at Shadow. “Those animals have no respect. By din-din time, they’d have been all over her.”

Shadow looked up and blinked at him.

“Don’t go looking at me like I’m some kind of kitty buffet, you damned beast!”

Shadow rested his head back on his paws, closing his eyes.

Before Mike could make some other sarcastic remark, Mrs. Martinson said, “Poor Ada. I guess I was one of the last people in the neighborhood on speaking terms with her. Ada’s house is just down the block a bit from mine and across the street.”

“I spoke to her just last week,” Mike grumbled, “after one of her menagerie mistook my roses for a litter box.”

“You shouted at her, you mean,” Mrs. Martinson replied.

“Sheriff Nesbit says hello, by the way,” Sunny said, hoping to change the subject.

Mike grunted. “He actually came down from Levett? A sure sign election time is just around the corner.”

“Actually, a town constable came first,” Sunny told her dad. “He didn’t seem to get along with the sheriff.”

“Sounds like Will Price.” Mike grinned. “The constables are supposed to report to the sheriff’s office, but Alderman Chase slipped Will in to annoy Frank Nesbit.”

Even after spending the better part of a year back in town, Sunny still didn’t have a handle on all the local politics. “Well, it seems to be working. What’s the problem between them?”

“Who was the sheriff before Frank got in?” Mike nudged her.

Sunny called on fuzzy memories of classroom visits from grammar school. “Sheriff Price. Oh. His son?”

“Stu Price was a good lawman.” Mike shook his head. “He made a mistake on one big case, and Frank just about ran him out of town.”

“Died just a couple of months after the election. Car accident.” Mrs. Martinson pursed her lips. “Or so they say.”

“Will left town—joined the state police way up north, and then wound up on the force over in Portsmouth,” Mike said. “But Chase persuaded him to come back to this side of the river. A lot of people, businessmen like Zack Judson over at the market and Ken Howell at the Crier , are getting sick of how Nesbit preaches about keeping Elmet safe while cooking the crime statistics. Assaults magically become harassment, or cases get pushed to other jurisdictions.”

“I didn’t realize you were so plugged in, Dad,” Sunny said.

Mike shrugged. “Folks talk to me. I’m around here all day with not much else to do.”

Mrs. Martinson cleared her throat. “Do you know how Ada … passed on?” Her sidewise glance at Mike showed the war between her curiosity and her fear of upsetting Sunny’s dad. “I know she’d been complaining about chest pains recently.”

“It was a fall,” Sunny said quickly, unwilling to get into a discussion about cardiac care. “She must have been going down into the cellar from the kitchen pantry—”

“Oh, no, that’s impossible,” Mrs. Martinson interrupted, drawing herself up from her perch on the couch to her full diminutive height. “Ada was deathly afraid of those stairs. She never used them.”

4

“Well, not necessarilynever, I guess,” Mike tried to joke.

But Mrs. Martinson remained very straight on the edge of the couch, quietly insistent. “Ada almost had a fall on those stairs years ago. I think Gordon Senior was still with us. Ever since that, whenever she had to go into the cellar, she went down through the door in the backyard.” She looked at Sunny. “Why do you think the cellar door hinges are rusted open?”